GO TO SOURCE COLOMBO, SRI LANKA, March 26, 2001: Sri Lankan Buddhists say they will build replicas of two ancient Buddha statues destroyed earlier this month by Afghanistan’s Taleban rulers. The private Maha Bodhi Society said it was hoping to receive public donations to create the replicas of the giant statues carved from a cliff face in central Bamiyan. The…
GO TO SOURCE JHARKLAND, INDIA, March 22, 2001: Villagers in the state have appealed to the government to help them in controlling the threat wild elephants are imposing on their lives. Terrified of the pachyderms, most villages now offer prayers to Lord Ganesh and keep night-time vigils. Apparently the problem escalates when baby elephants wander into the villages and their…
GO TO SOURCE BOSTON, MASSACHUCETTS, March 25, 2001: Twenty-six first-graders from St. Catherine of Genoa School in Somerville file into the basement chapel of the Roman Catholic church. But Hriday Chawla isn’t thinking about Jesus Christ. He’s speaking to Ganesh, the Hindu God. Classmate Rupinder Kaur, a girl with long dark hair, worships the Sikh Waheguru. Roughly 25 percent of…
GO TO SOURCE LUCKNOW, INDIA, March 23, 2001: The sectarian riots and violence in Uttar Pradesh’s largest industrial town in Kanpur, sparked off by the alleged burning of pages of the Koran in Delhi by Hindu activists, claimed 16 lives last week. The police opened fire to control the rioters and some persons in the mob retaliated by firing AK47…
GO TO SOURCE The Hindu Council of Australia called off its protest march against an Australian labor union accused of desecrating the famous Sri Venkateswara Temple. The Council withdrew its call following an apology by the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU). A CFMEU team visited the temple and removed eight stonemasons, alleging gross underpayment and unsafe living conditions.…
GO TO SOURCE BANGALORE, INDIA, March 15, 2001: India has become the back office for many American companies. So expounds this article that illustrates that Indian Companies such as Customer Asset groom their employees to familiarize them with American culture and give them a fictitious identity. Providing services to companies such as General Electric and British Airways, they then field…
GO TO SOURCE LONDON, ENGLAND, March 23, 2001: Have you always thought that by simply looking at a person’s face you could tell whether he or she is a smoker? Now there is scientific proof to back up your guess. A study conducted by Professor Antony Young at Guys, Kings and St. Thomas’ School of Medicine has shown that the…
GO TO SOURCE COLOMBO, SRI LANKA, March 21, 2001: Mediterranean cuisine is redolent with olive oil and no Chinese chef will stir fry without sesame oil, but in Sri Lanka, coconut oil is at the heart of a heated controversy, according to this report in India Abroad. Statistics show 521 per 100,000 Sri Lankans die of coronary disease, and healthcare…
GO TO SOURCE DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA, March 20, 2001: Indian women in South Africa have found a new niche to promote and protect their religion. Twenty-four diligent participants, all of them female, have graduated from the Arya Pratinidhi Sabha Academy. Started in 1954, the institution teaches interested persons a weekly class for three years. Under the tutelage of trained priests,…
GO TO SOURCE FIJI, March 23, 2001: Last May’s coup toppled the democratically-elected government, but Fiji’s caretaker Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase announced a two-week period for the elections starting August 25 to enable citizens in remote islands to vote. He said the country’s president, Ratu Josefa Iloilo, had set the date for polls for the 71-seat parliament. Qarase took charge…